Kerala government opposes leasing of Trivandrum airport

Kerala government has opposed the leasing of Trivandrum airport to private entities. In a letter to the Prime Minister, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan rejected that Union Cabinet’s approval to hand over Thiruvananthapuram International Airport to the private sector.

The Union Cabinet had on Wednesday approved the proposal for leasing out airports at Jaipur, Guwahati and Thiruvananthapuram through public-private partnership (PPP).

Adani Enterprises had won the rights to run six airports -- Lucknow, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Mangaluru, Thiruvananthapuram, and Guwahati -- through the PPP model after a competitive bidding process in February 2019.

Vijayan wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, seeking his intervention and to reconsider the decision as it would be "difficult" for the state to cooperate.